


A New Moon Rises

by rextyle



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Basically, DarkFord, DemonFord, Gore, Horror, M/M, Macabre, Mind fuckery, Nightmares, Please don't read this lmao, Violence, apocalypse themes, brotherly shit, forgive me if we're friends, like monsters, noncon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-06
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:42:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23040403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rextyle/pseuds/rextyle
Summary: (Fanmade sequel to Helios by Fooeyburr.) Mind broken, shattered and utterly reformed, the reborn Ford Pines, Helios, traverses his new world under Bill's guiding light. And finds himself drawn to something...odd. And somehow incomplete.
Relationships: Bill Cipher/Ford Pines, Bill Cipher/The Author | Original Stanford Pines, Ford Pines & Stan Pines
Comments: 6
Kudos: 17





	1. Zeus's Son

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I couldn't get this fic out of my head. It's plaguing me. You ever just get so lost in a fic that it just shakes your face in? So yeah, I wrote more. Someone stop this madness. Just doing this 100% for myself for real go back. Straight fucked up BillFord and Stan and Ford brotherships. And this author killing me apparently. Go read the original [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6375979), Helios by Fooeyburr. Killing me.

_"Hey, Fordsy. Why don't you tell me who you worship...?"_ The whisper took him. Touched through every nerve, drew in him a comfort, a fire of need, something running through every piece of him.

"Y-... _you_ Bill," He whispered, lost in reverence and numb, distant ideas, voice pleading, clutching to the being, held cradled in his arms like a child. And there an easy smile darkened, playing and dancing against that eye. An adoring glint flashing there. 

"Who's your _god_ , Sixer?"

"Y-you...you are. You are...my god. You're everything. _Everything,_ Bill." He whispered fiercely, the words falling from him like a song, like a prophetic tune, like a manic, broken truth that he could never pull from, never deny, never _see_ past. Not anymore. The frantic adoration painted so clearly in that faded, broken, distraught gaze. Bill's mirth deepened, and he stroked a hand against the...well, no longer human's, hair. He felt it tangle gently in them, using it to grasp and lift the new reborn creature's head, meeting his lusted, glazed eyes.

"Good boy, Sixer...you're my good little partner, aren't ya? I'm proud of you, Smart Guy."

He shuddered at that, breath leaving him in a hush. The voice already enough to caress every inch of nerves, inch of insanity in his broken wretch of a mind. It was everything. Every light. Every reach. Every need. Every hope. It all twisted inside him, writhing like a pit of flashing snakes, tunneling against his being.

"I'm proud of you, Helios." And that all seeing eye transformed into a mouth, kissing at the tip of the man's head, jagged teeth brushing against his scalp. It was everything. Everything. _Everything_. He didn't need or want anything else at all, that horrific adoration flooding every inch of him, the only light to fill every space, every crack, every molecule of his being. And Bill seemed pleased. So pleased. And that, that was everything too, right there and then, even in a fit of horror, a fit of repulsion and delusion and reaching, grasping denial that fought with him.

"You made this happen, ya know. Twice now...you're my Sun God now, kid. And you're always going to be mine, aren'tchya, Sixer?"

"Y...yes....yes..." He whispered, broken. He needed this. He...couldn’t do this. He couldn’t... " _Yes_." He shook. Some part of him, lost, struggling in that deep pit of snakes, recoiled, disgusted and horrified. A silent scream volting out and through his bones, paralyzing him in the madness. But somehow it was all just driven out, drowned in a desperation, a need. Blood stained Bill's arms. The black mingling with spots, stains of dark red, cracking at the edges where they'd dried. A black tongue snaked out from beneath that eye, flicking to coil around him, touch every space, every scar, every cut and burn that adorned, marking his body. He found himself arch into the sensation, the fire, the pain that twisted, finding home in a crazed, manic adoration and love...something so dark. So wrong. So beautiful.

Yes. He would be Bill's, for eternity. Until the end of time. _Until the end of time._

Sixer was his. And he would worship him, they would explore this space, drag, dance through this new, great cosmos just like they had always been; new transformations, beautiful linings, lovely new horrors to spread, to learn, to create, new thrilling moments, forever. Bill wished for it and so therefore, it would be. There was really nothing else to be said in the matter. And boy, even if he’d predicted it, even if he’d mapped it and seen it’s reveal with such clarity for old Sixer, it didn’t make the victory any less sweet. Or for him, any less cherished.

* * *

Dark. Oh, it was dark. The entire world was in chaos, a slew of broken pieces and nonsense, a complete disconnect that overpowered every sense now. Everything devolved into beautiful, insane _chaos_. 

Helios stood, towering tall and easy over that chaos as it sang to him, ringing a tune like a choir, a disjumbled, perfect melody. The creation of a new reality just against his fingertips. He reached out his arms, six fingers spreading into a tower of light. Cracks appeared, slicing through the fabric of the air. Disjointed tremors roared through the ground in a bright, red light. Pieces of rock and building, of animal and water twisted, forming together, melding, merging, pulsing and shrieking in agony. He rose them up against the screen of the new world, the chaos that never stopped, never stopped, the eternal flare of the unhinged and manic, following each deranged delirium that filled through his brain. And in that, he twisted, creating a living pyramid. It shrieked, in the chorus of a thousand shrilling voices. A new song...

Helios would spend the next few years traversing all of the earth, creating, marking and sharpening out triangles in every corner, every inch for Bill to observe through and simply _see_ his work. Occasionally he would kill, mutilate, destroy but most of all, most of all, he would create. Create something _new_. Something impossible. Something beautiful and horrific. Something _free_ from sense or logic or understanding _._ The world became a canvas of worship for Helios, a painting of adoration, a marking to a new beginning. A work of art for a single being. _For him._ And it would carry on like this...his work never changing.

Helios. The deity of the sun.

It wouldn't be long before the whole earth shuddered, stricken still by that name and the chaos and ruin it left behind; the insanity, the terror and beautiful chaos. And Bill always seemed to enjoy, fascinate at his new arrangements, his alterations, his endless ideas. Creativity was not something Helios lacked, and Bill loved him for that. Loved him for many things. Many things. So many things. His partner...and his god.

He'd look up at that eye, taken in by the shadow, out in the cosmos. They'd sit, laying against a different space, a different bed, a new canvas of walls glowing a brilliant blue. In the cosmos lay ancient, endless stars. Galaxies. And there was Bill's new castle, his new playground, among them. He'd left that dollhouse behind. He'd taken up higher grounds, better grounds, a better space in the cosmos for his lodgings. And one room, Bill's room, was often reserved for just the two of them. A chapel. A monument. A place for simply for Helios to sing praise.

Helios adored it. Helios faltered in it. Helios despised, despaired, Helios _needed_ beyond repair. And that too, Bill loved about him. Endless adoration. Endless praise. And unrelinquishing, unending desperation to simply _be there,_ not functioning apart from him and incapable not to plead, beg for Bill to crawl his way under every pulse of his torn, marked and weathered out skin. He hated it. He loved it. He needed it.

The universe would change. Reality would change. Everything would change. Forever. And through it all, Bill held him, gentle and soft, a chain grasped in one hand, gentle palms brushing down the base of his neck to find the supple heat of skin, and beyond, the slippings of simple flesh, red blood blossoming and pulling soft noises lost in the desperations behind. A place of worship. Held in solitude as he collapsed against himself.

Somewhere he knew, he had chosen this. Somewhere he'd lost hold of it. Somewhere, this was all that mattered anymore. And somewhere, _somewhere he knew,_ it was all that would matter ever again.


	2. The Stain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And he found it there, a curious thing indeed.

A stain. There was a stain on the floor. 

Helios stood over it, considering it mildly. He tilted his head, a certain kind of bracing curiosity taking into him. He walked around it, looking it over once again. All the while old, familiar fires of greens and blues erupted outside. A world of utter incomprehensibility shifted, dancing and changing in senseless chaos. Creatures and nonsensibility forming, twisting, vanishing, recreating. It was a beautiful work, out of this pyramid, this sacred space. But not one that drew to him right now. No. Not now.

Here, at the penthouse, in the tip of an old Fearamyd, he stood. A special place to him. Used really only once in a long stretch, whatever was deemed as an "anniversary" or at a particular time Bill saw fit. Purely for nostalgia's sake in brief and rare moments where they wouldn't be out there instead against the cosmos, at Bill's new sanctuary among the stars. 

Here though was a space that held much meaning...much comfort. It held things Helios couldn't place from his tongue into authentic words, spilling instead listless and desperate, drowning across his brain in shivers and endless pits of worship and need.

And strangely...oddly, it too held a very, very strange stain marked along the carpet. Something old. And pertinent. And...curious. Drawing to him far too often in its off hand, pulling sort of intrigue.

Truthfully it was a strange idea. One that had been there for, it seemed, all of time. For really as long as he could ever recall. And it never changed. Why need change? Time was gone. Therefore it remained, just as it was, just as strange. Just as drawing to him; a spot of black in the middle of an otherwise immaculate space. Something _just_ out of place.

Helios lifted his hands, spreading them out as if in a small shift, a subtle wave of movement. His hair floated, the long tangled rags of threading curls shifting up and glowing softly in reds and painted, vibrant crimson, floating against the air. His skin was still wrapped entirely in scars, his entire body stained in old, matted and dried red, a blue glowing collar with a loose chain fastened, burned into the flesh of his neck. Eyes, what seemed to be dozens, had long since exploded across his head over the millennia to reach back and form beyond the back of it. And his arms, three at each side, each with six fingers wove through the air around him purely on intuition. Pulling from a nibbling, interested, disjointed curiosity he still held when staring at this space against the floor, as he sometimes had over the period of ancient millennia.

The stain itself grew a hot red, glowing gently, not too dissimilar to his own body's glow. That bizarre small coating of black, frozen always in time. Things could remain forever. He could remain forever. Bill would remain forever. Nothing aged, nothing had to any longer. And as it glowed, the stain slowly took shape, rewinding its path to where it had ended up. The stain twisting and pulling back, tearing into a shape that swirled around the carpeted floor, rematerializing, forming again into a strange, odd thing indeed.

A twist of familiarity curled in his head. A chittering, a mantra, a something that tapped at his skull. Tapping away, but met only really with a strange interest. After all Helios was no stranger to the mad, the gleaming gleeful, the sharpening of manic fangs. He knew them and had befriended them well by now. And if they tapped at his brain, ripping down his spine and cluttering through into the bones at his chest, they were met more as a pet returning home, scratched at the ear and patted down with open welcome. No. Insanity was not something he was a stranger to at all.

He tilted his head at the form in front of him, motioning an arm and gripping at the air, forming the shape back into reality. The here and now. 

A shaking, rattled gasp exploded through the reborn thing's mouth, stopping short on a scream. And it collapsed, shaking and sputtering to the floor, eyes wide in terror and agony, the sight as if that of a caged, devoured animal looking up to him. 

Helios looked down on the creature, intrigue touching his senses, blinking down with mismatched eyes.

"Y-you...what..." The voice faltered, aghast, horrified and clearly panicked. "What...what did you do to Ford? Where...where is he?" He gasped.

Helios observed this creature. He observed the strangeness of its being. Its dual limbs. Its odd face. Its...strange something, _something_ that seemed to knock, tapping at his ageless mind. He crouched, towering twice the size of the being, peering down and placing six clawed hands at his knees as he looked it over. So odd. He almost seemed to be tinging with something...familiar. Something he couldn't say. What an odd creature. And an odd stain. 

How many times had he circled around it over the millennia? Curiosity, something deeper pressing, coiling, burning at the back of his brain like an itch of pure fire. Of course, he hadn't quite done _this_ before. Hadn't investigated beyond curious pacing, prodding, pushing and nagging ideas. After all his mind, spirit, entire being only had one focus, one need, one _purpose_. It had one thought, just one mantra that coursed every nerve of him. One consuming reality. And it hadn't been the stain....so he'd left it be. Left it to be curious. And odd. And somewhat drawing. And somewhat...what? Something else too, left in the multitude of noise and festering and craze of his mind. Something that ran almost gently, slicing like scissors, like claws, or flayed ropes that touched, dipping into the muscles and skin and bone. Something panicked, something that held a mantra of its own, something...perhaps…well.

_"I'm so sorry....I'm so sorry....I'm so-"_

Whatever it was, he never paid it too much attention. He did not visit this space too often unless nostalgia or Bill himself called to him. Helios didn't need to sleep. Didn't need to rest. So why involve himself in this room at all when Bill was not there to lavish into his everything, pull out everything he was within these walls? To bring him back to himself and rip him apart again until nothing old was left. He shuddered, shivering against those manic and light touches of thought, his gazes though, all of them, drifting then again to the thing as it spoke.

...How curious. 

"I...hey...HEY, I'm _TALKING_ to ya, ya-ya multi-eyed **_freak!_** Where the hell's my brother!?" The anger and fear exploded from the thing, all combining into one, taking a brave step forward as if in some threat. But Helios...well, he said nothing. And Helios could say nothing, not ever. His lips were sealed.

And it seemed the thing, the odd frail thing finally took notice, faltering in his fury, turning a little more pale.

"I...hey, is...is your mouth...?"

He stared down, expression blank but still veering on a manic curiosity. He tilted his head to the other side, hair spilling in time.

It was what it was...Helios's lips had been sewn shut, many eons ago, it felt. They were reserved, his voice, the entirety of his being, his entire soul and spirit only for _one thing._ One idea. One _God_. One everything. His praises were meant in that quiet, whispered places alone.

It wasn't meant for strange, unnecessary ideas such as...talking. Conversation. Words were blasphemous, somehow, out here, apart from that place now. Unwanted. He didn't need them in the new world, not apart from that place, not ever, not ever. Not once.

_"Just for me, Sixer...your lips, your words, everything...you understand, buddy?"_

The odd creature blanched, fumbling back and falling onto the ground at the extra realization, the gruesome twist of fabric that needled through his mouth. And for some reason, Helios took time to inch closer, peering over him. So...odd. Odd.

He brought a hand out, waving it in a sophisticated manner, followed soon by the cooperations of five others, a soft red glow springing from each palm. He felt...somehow not...quite right with how things were. Leaving this creature like this. And in a moment, that thing's aged, terrified and wide eyed face changed, shifting, abruptly growing younger. 

Of course, there was something to be said about decay, about death, about the disappearance and withering of life. A chorus of beautiful music that he loved to play, create, dance alongside with. Loved to taunt and transform and build, destroy and twist against this new world. Reality was not reality here, and anything was possible. He'd made this world a monument to Bill, cherishing every idea that came to him, every equation, every thrill of insanity in just imagining how it might please, might replicate, be made more. But still, for whatever reason, he didn't quite like that decay on this small thing. Instead he moved to give it life. He gave it a new body, a stronger body, a younger one that shined, that glowed in the energy and color of youth. The creature itself, the once stain just stared at its hands once he was done, looking dumbfounded, bewildered, torn and still so furious and terrified. "What...jesus, what the _hell_...?"

He leaned over to peer at the thing again, feeling a bit more content with it. That was decent. That was better. Youth looked better on this thing. He considered, toying with making him even younger, like a pupa, a larva stage of a creature. But he withheld, finding himself content in this moment and leaning back up instead. It would do. His gaze drifted out. He would have to go though, for some time. He had spent enough time here satiating in his curiosities. He had things to create, to destroy, to change and remodel. Great big wings, crunching out from bone and flesh tore from his back in a spray of blood. And his gaze twisted to the window, to the open still sky; the one that had yet to change for millennia. And with a powerful burst of red light, the creature, the god, the sun, burst out into the air, souring out and leaving the thing behind.

Later. Later maybe he would return to see the thing. Curious at how it would be then. If it would be at all. That strange, odd little stain.

In the mean time, he had much to do. He always did. Chaos would spill, fester, build and collapse...and all for the sake of just one love. A canvas of beautiful terror and thrilling pain, to match his inner mind, to devolve, change, shift into a weird, strange, bizarre and perfectly unhinged world. A world he would always rule. And as it seemed, as it had felt like to him, he always had. Eternity. That seemed to be the space he and Bill had come from...and nothing else beyond it had ever really made sense.

\--------

"Okay. So you've been captured by a...creature. Of some kind. A demon. Monster. Weird...weird freak kinda thing." Stanley stared at himself in a giant mirror set against the wall, patting at his now far too young face and cheek, looking entirely unnerved and doing his best not to _entirely_ just lose his damn head. "But that's fine, Stanley, you can get outta this. You're going to get out of this." Honestly his thoughts were pretty frantic, just flat out spilling over themselves, reaching to practical hyperventilation on his part. Running off kilter about the kids. About Soos. About his brother. About _what the hell had just even happened here._

For the life of him, he couldn't remember what had even gone down before waking up here to that...that _monster_. That horrific thing. One moment he was fighting tooth and nail, scratching and yelling and struggling to hell to get to his brother, to that form laying against the bed, that...

His heart stopped, staring numbly at his reflection, the reality of it sinking in at the memory. More gruesomely than before. Far more clear. It put a cold kind of ice to settle over frayed nerves, chilling him to the bone.

Ford...

He could still see the mess of a man that had laid there, naked, mutilated, nothing even like that of someone...someone _human._ Not anymore. He felt himself swallow back a pull of nausea, gripping his fists pale and raw, drowning the lurch of bile that coiled through his stomach. God. Christ. _Christ_ . He had to find him. He _had_ to. He wouldn't leave him here. Not like that, he wouldn't. He _couldn't do it._

His eyes whirled around, taking in the scene, desperate to find the horror show that was his brother that was still so fresh against his mind. The room itself was exactly as it had been before. Piano, triangle bed, sofa, throw rug, chair, crackling fire place...the only difference was that Ford wasn't strapped to that damn twisted sick bed anymore. But the blood...god, the stains were still there. Jesus. Still so fresh looking. It couldn't have been that long. Right? He had to still be here _somewhere._ Right?! He felt sick. He felt the anger, the turmoil and rage, the disgust and terror pull through him in a wave, shaking him deep. And too the determination, and maybe desperation, turning into it all into something harder, forged through it like steel. 

Goddamn it. He was going to _find_ his brother, damned be this world and that monster that had done this to them. And then he'd find the kids, and Soos, and get the _hell_ out of here.

He made his mind up and turned, taking into the space.

But as he fumbled around, trying to find a way out, he discovered pretty quickly he couldn't find anything that seemed remotely like an exit. As if the one he'd come in had simply been flattened over and built anew. He yelled out, calling himself horse for the kids, for Soos, for Ford, but it was sealed all around him, with just the open window as an escape, towering miles and miles over the earth. Useless. Stan, frustrated, collapsed momentarily into the sofa, before leaping back up with a yell as it shifted and groaned beneath him. He stared as eyes blinked open, a tongue lolling out from a split in the leathery fabric. "Yeesh. Freak show." He muttered gruffly, stepping back, rubbing at his arm unconsciously. It was starting to sink in now how much harder this was going to be than he'd first wanted. Being here, like this...god, it was going to make him go crazy.

\--------

It turned out this...thing. This _monster_ . That creature. Visited often. It also turned out that it...uh, probably understood what he was saying? Well. At least it sat and listened, if nothing else. At first he'd spent an inordinate time yelling, cursing, shoving, demanding answers and giving nothing but threats. Demanding his brother. Demanding an _out._ But it had just stood, crouching there over him, blank and somewhat intrigued. It also never seemed to get hurt. He’d tried attacking it a few times, but the splintered remains of a table had done nothing to sway or effect the creature. At one point it had simply brought a finger to poke at him curiously, to which he'd yelped and spat a few more rough threats. But then, after a stretch, a certain period of time, the yelling and demanding had gotten old. He soon came to realize that this...thing didn't particularly have any ill intentions for him. Or any intentions to give into his threats. It more just kept him there. Like some kind of...pet, or something.

The damned thing itself was beyond horrific. Every inch of it was _straight_ from a horror movie or maybe his worst nightmares if he dug deep enough. Skin layered in so many scars and symbols it didn't even seem to really be proper skin anymore. Burns distorting into shapes and triangles. Coated with old blood, and fresh blood from wounds that never quite seemed to heal. It's dozens of eyes were grotesque and varied wildly in color and animals; some cat, some goat, some human, spreading from its face and littering disjointed all the way to the back of his head, buried over by mats of wild, long and tangled brown hair. But the weirdest and frankly most disturbing thing about it wasn't any of that. It wasn't the fact its lips were gruesomely bound together by thick yellow thread, nor the six arms, nor the collar fused and bound at its neck or those claws spread all the way to the tips of its fingers. No, it was that damned immaculate, perfectly clean, dark green suit and sharp black bow tie that seemed to throw the whole monstrosity bizarrity level into overdrive against its torso. Totally spotless, not even the blood staining its frame, somehow beyond logic. The weirdness factor had it bumping _straight_ up on the scale with that. Things grotesque and horrific should never be paired with well dressed.

The thing brought him food and water occasionally, but Stan was soon to discover he didn't need it. He enjoyed the damn human food, don't get him wrong, but found he never got hungry or thirsty. It had to be whatever this creature had done to him earlier, doubtlessly. Whatever _that_ had been. But he was young again, maybe in his late teens. It was...bizarre. And he still couldn't work out _why_. Or how. He guessed in this weird world all sorts of insane things were possible. Maybe there _was_ no reason.

"So I says to the guy, I tell him, my wife still misses me..." He paused, looking up to the massive shadow of a creature, cracking a grin, "But 'er _AIM IS GETTING BETTER!"_ And he howled, slapping at a knee, the two at this point in time sitting at the throw rug near the bed. Stanley refused to touch the bed at all. Refused to look at it almost ever, on any day. And boy had the days...or...time? At least, stretched by. Wasn't really days anymore, not in this apocalyptic world where the sky remained the same red stretch of horror. But it really felt like it had been ages since reawakening here. Really, honestly, far, far too long.

The creature just listened, looking down at him. To his surprise, a quirk of a smile twitched on its otherwise blank face, looking momentarily amused. "Hahah, got ya there, didn't I?" He asked, feeling bizarrely proud of himself, nudging it in the side. He rarely got much reaction from the thing. "Hey AntiClopse," He began then suddenly after a pause, voice dropping somewhat to a more serious tone, coining off the nickname he'd given to the creature ages back by now, "Listen. If we ever do find my family...ya think you could do the same thing you did for me? You know, bring them back, make them okay?" He looked up into those dozens of unsettling eyes. Some of them were wandering across the window, some in another direction, twitching this way and that, off to the fire place. And maybe six or so of them focused on him. The thing's eyeballs did that, often jumping around, nonsensically, without logic or reason. Reminding him of his jar of eyes at the Shack, almost. "Ey, 'ey, listen, come on pal, seriously. I'm talking to you here." All of those eerie, disturbing eyes finally shifted and focused in on him at that. He grinned weakly at the disturbing stares. Boy, he had a death wish, didn't he? Stan cleared his throat. "Listen, I'm serious...think ya can do that for me? They're...well, they're pretty important is all." But AntiClopse just stared. That's mostly all he did, really. This hadn't been the first time Stan had made the request or demand. Or talked about his family, either. Typically it was met with nothing at all. Stan often talked about them, or demanded to be let out to find them...but that had been quite a while ago too.

Stan studied the other, before letting out a heavy sigh.

"Yeah, didn't think so, honestly. But hey. Guy can try, can't he?" He asked weakly. Again, the monster didn't speak. But, surprisingly it lowered itself down, lying against the rug. Its head hit the ground, stretching out like some kind of giant, strange and chaotic beast. And with just another moment, it glowed a bright red, shrinking in size, until it seemed to match Stan's. It looked up to him.

"Oh, uh..." He shifted his eyes back, uncertain and suddenly awkward, "Ooo...kay?" He looked back down, and the AntiClopse suddenly brought out its hands, just two of them, to the air. It began moving them in time with each other and...hold up, _was that signing?_ Was he...was that _sign language?_ "Oh shoot, uh, crap...look, my signing is a little rusty." He squinted, trying to make out the words. AntiClopse paused and made his hands go slower. " _I'_ _ll...try?_ Is that...wait, ya serious?" Anticlopse dropped its arms and continued to stare. Had he just signed "I'll try?" In _American Sign Language_ ? The shit? "Wait, you...so you _understand_ me?" He asked then, feeling shocked, dumbfounded. The damn thing just continued to look at him blankly, unnervingly.

God. Dumb AntiClopse. Dumb... _everything_.

They stayed like that for a while, and with a sigh, muttering something about _"woulda been nice if ya'd done that at literally any other point,"_ Stan opened his mouth to continue on with his tales. He worked out a particular memory from Columbia, mapping it out for the creature in detail and going through the life threatening adventure, scamming, threats and mobster chases. Anticlopse seemed to relax in it, simply listening, taken to the story. Whatever Stan tried, it no longer raised its hands and spoke to him again though. Well. It had been something, for a moment there at least.

\--------

"Listen. I was just thinking, it'd be nice to have like...ya know. At least books. Doubt there's really television here anymore. But say, why not get me a book on sign language? Let me brush up a bit."

His words again were only replied with a blank stare. Nothing much had come of it. But within the next...what, week? A pile of books had appeared one day, stacked up against the window. One of which was the basics for ASL. He had no idea how they'd survived the mess of chaos that had been humanity...but heck, he'd take it.

\--------

"And you wouldn't believe it, there I was, fists raised, risking my life and charging the monster just to save a damned _pig_!" He yelled, throwing his arm in the air.

Anticlopse brought up two hands, marking a quick, _'What then?'_

He grinned, "And _then_ , the thing tried to eat us! But, hoho! I was too quick, I tell ya. I leapt over it, and landed _right on its back!"_

\--------

"Listen AntiClopse...what is your real name anyways?" He glanced over, settled in and surrounded by packs of beers, half an old 1965 El Diablo convertible that had been ripped from the front that he'd taken to sleeping in, an old television with a variety of many old movies, and empty sandwich wrappers that littered around them. AntiClopse considered him, but it was one of those occasions it didn't seem keen on even responding. Well, alright then, whatever. That was fine by him. He shrugged it off. "Well, either way, why the heck don't we get out of here at some point? It's been what...I don't know, a ton of time, right? A lotta months, right? Maybe longer?"

Anticlopse responded then, signing, _'Time is dead,'_ and he threw a quick shove into the creature's mangled, grotesque shoulder.

"I know that _wise guy_ , but come on. Obviously there's still somethin' going. Point being, been here a long whatever, right?" The thing stared at that, blankly, eyes twisting about. Enough were on him to know he was...well, probably listening. "So, why don't we break free sometime? Get out of here?" 

_'Maybe even find my family.'_ He thought. Fat chance with how long it had been. But a guy could dream. Right?

\--------

It hadn't even taken long before one day (or whatever) the Anticlopse had crawled into the room, crouched near Stanley, and swept him up with one giant claw. He had transformed into a towering figure, with great, fleshy wings and bones at his back. The two had taken off before he'd had a chance to yelp or curse too loudly and fully.

The wind ripping through their collective hair (the monster's much more mangled and plentied than his), the sky towering in red, the horror show the same as always. Stan could hardly keep pace with any of it. He was yelling at first, "Oh _shit,_ holy fuck, _goddamn it_ ," before he'd settled to clutching against the rank creature's hide, staring in disbelief at the crumpled mess of life beneath them. Out among the once world were shapes and twisted forms, living weirdness at _every corner_. He spotted Gompers still roaming around, giant and huge, saw statues bouncing around, and the ground shifting as if a living, pulsing things. Tendrils crawled, trees twisted into mismatched and odd, disturbing shapes and fire of different colors exploded, ravishing everything at random. It was a lot. And suddenly, he felt a twinge of regret for wanting to see it at all in the first place as the wind tore over him.

They'd landed out near the lake, the old lake, and he noticed offhand that most of the madness, the creatures, seemed to give them a wide berth, shrinking into the foliage. AntiClopse set him down, before crouching beside him, staring up at the lake. Stan breathed hard, clutching his chest,

"Jesus _CHRIST."_ He gasped, glaring up at the creature in dumb disbelief. "Warn a guy before ya do that, won't you?" AntiClopse seemed entirely unphased, looking over the calm of the red liquid spread before them rather contemplatively. If you could call a look like that from dozens upon dozens of eyes. It took Stan a little too long to see what it really was out there...the dark, thick liquid of the lake was blood. "Huh..." He said quietly. For some reason he wasn't exactly surprised. Nor, somehow, that shaken either. Maybe spending so much time with a literal horror show that reeked of blood and decay numbed the senses a bit. Maybe the idea of the end of the world, from what he'd made from that top floor of the pyramid had dulled and numbed him to it all. Maybe the end of the world into a pit of weirdness had just sunken in too deep to deny by now.

The two sat there at the edge of the dock, Anticlopse's hair swishing and swaying like living, breathing snakes against the air. Despite the vague horror and terror of macabre that it was, he had to admit to there being something about getting out of that room for the first time in too long, even if that latent horror lingered around there somewhere.

"Jesus...wish this water wasn't...ya know. Like this..." He spoke, voice grating, looking over the pool to his reflection staring back. It was still young. Identical to when he'd first seen himself after waking up. "Christ. Can't it just be water? Can't this place just be...not a horror show for once?"

It was just a simple glance his way, and the monster beside him seemed to consider something before it dipped its clawed fingers into the pool of blood. And then, all at once, starting from those tips, rippled out a vast and entirely clear blue, spilling out in a wave across the surface. It reached the edge, where the trees seemed to shift, recreated and returning to be as Stan remembered them. Normal. Entirely...normal. The air too adapted a familiar, old, fresh quality to it, buzzing bugs chirping into life, birds singing gently, a flood of regular life. The weird horrific apocalypse was still at the edges, the deformed mess present across that small sphere of _normal_ , but it seemed to stay there, remaining at the edge. 

Somewhat alarmed, Stanley glanced over to the other, studying him carefully. Quietly. He fell silent for a long, long moment, before finally speaking up. "....Thanks." He said quietly. AntiClopse said nothing at all. And they sat there together, in a...bizarre and strange companionable silence, staring out into the now familiar, normal lake. Stan did his best to ignore the small wooden boat, moored to the dock that read a scratched in “Stan o’ War” which bobbed gently at the side, a living relic of something long ago past and left behind.


	3. Reverie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There he was, his little nightmare, his flame of the chaotic, the whole of the cosmos sitting in the palm of his hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoever gave this kudos, please seek help. 
> 
> Also sorry for the mess folks, boy this fic is seriously solely for me and my inability to do things thanks to its previous author. Linking [again here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6375979) that diabolical motherfucker, because I'm seriously stuck here.

Wow, had he been busy. Time sure flies when it no longer exists! But as much as he regretted not always slicing the space and time and fabric of matter itself for his little partner, his little quantum of macabre, he had a lot of things in the works. A lot of _plans_ on the horizon. Still, boy. He sure needed this. As much as Sixer, it looked like by now. How embarrassing! Who knew you could get so attached to something you’d once just considered a worthless pawn. Well, hey, not that he’d ever admit it! After all the bundle of nightmares and chaos that was _his_ Sixer worshipped the threads of him more powerfully, more entirely than any substance, air, or form of living need that had ever once crossed paths with his little reborn phoenix. 

The way the chaos god, the deity of the sun trembled into him, spoke of whatever he asked in a certain desperation that, frankly, was _adorable_ on his mutated ball of senselessness, like a child in the throws of being lost, and the way he unraveled willingly into chaotic and nightmarish ways that even tickled _his_ fancy, lord and king of all nightmares and chaos, took him in, hook, line, and sinker. It was more than he could have hoped for. Honestly, who was supposed to be who’s master here!?! Sixer certainly had a lot of nerve, falling like puddy into his palms and becoming even more enticing than he’d ever pictured eons ago.

But hey! Who was he to spit in the face of senseless destruction, even when it was actually _kind of_ his own? Even though he’d predicted that the strange freak of a creature, Stanford Pines, was the perfect match for him in a lot of ways to rule this brand new cosmos, it still took him by surprise how much he’d taken to him. Lifetimes ago, ever since dipping his fingers into the darker...more, uh _perverse_ sides of his little once-human, it had ticked off an idea of the future right then and there to everything that had unfolded. The whole equation and need for it had just spurred on his plans a bit earlier than intended, that was all. 

Still, geez, these eons sure went from having an interest into something, to being utterly possessive of it. Maybe even obsessed! Who could say. One thing was sure, when he took the time off from his usual dimension, complete universe domination and rule, he seemed to pool into a place with the other that could be matched by nothing else. Nothing. No endless party, no parade or play of macabre, no chaos in the eternal could match it. Folding it all into a kind of spiritual, morbid release; like something sacred and unspoken filtering between them. God and servant. Deity and partner. Master and pet. But also, really, so much more than all that. Really, his and Fordsy's relationship was a lot deeper than just all _that_. It was almost an insult to even think otherwise, mulling on it.

And after all when you were the king of everything, you had your hands full pretty often and having a space to just... _let loose_ with a creature like Sixer, well…

He’d just have to say it was well worth the wait in between and he really should focus more time on it. A millennia of time together was _nothing_ and he couldn’t wait to show the little god what held out against the spread of this chaotic existence for the rest of eternity.

And somehow too through the time, the stretch of whatever bits of animated matter that coursed and evolved through this reality, had just made him all the more thrilled with the tiny god.

Perfect. His perfect little sun. Devouring the sense and normality of his once stale, flat little world. 

The little nightmare practically followed in his own footsteps. And he found he loved him all the more for it.

He gave a vague signal to his little chaotic hell hound as he’d transported out toward the once Milky Way in a jet of brilliant blue flame and light, laughing as he dodged a planet that had been turned sentient trying to take a bite out of him.

“Whoa-ho!! _Feisty!_ ” He laughed before speeding towards a great, bright, shining star of light that shone out against the distance.

There was that second home, he had plenty of them. After all, a galaxy like _this_ dimension had was practically infinite. Still, he felt a rush at the sight of the great glowing starlight of a pyramid, a surge of anticipation, sleek and sides glowing white as the moon that faded out far in the distance of a planet, his deity's planet, glowing out in the distance. He had been waiting a _little too long_ for this reunion. And he had to admit, it ate at him a bit. It sure would be good to see that kid’s mutilated face again.

\--------

“H-Hey! What’s going on? AntiClopse, where…”

Stan leapt to his feet as his companion froze and stood swift and abrupt, every inch of him aware and raising on end. Every long thread of hair leaping up as if snakes peeking out from the lid of a straw barrel, dancing as every eye fixed, sharp and suddenly _entire alert_ , off against the great, never changing sky.

Stan had never seen the AntiClopse like this. So still. So aware. So _present,_ as if even breathing would break a spell so terrible that it couldn’t really be put in front of them to begin with. A slight sound, the first one he’d _ever_ heard from the thing, hissed out from him in a keening rumble, an unearthly, monstrous thing...it had a kind of. What? Wow, some sort of need to it? Or what...?

Stan couldn’t begin to identify it, even if he’d _wanted_ to. After all, AntiClopse was a monster. And who was Stanley Pines to dig out a degree on Monster Behavior and Life, right?

Maybe he’d just seen a particularly delicious looking mutated hell-bird and wanted to go chase after it.

Rather abruptly, the sudden trance seemed to break. AntiClopse turned his gazes, all of them, to Stan. And without so much as a lick of warning, it shifted all of its arms, waving and syncing them in a way that Stan had come to relate with weird and bizarre and sometimes kinda horrific things.

Without warning, a red glow took to the atmosphere. And it flooded over Stan, who gave out a sudden yelp at the unexpected sensation, his heart leaping into gear and panic.

“H-Hey-- _what_ \--” But before he had time to protest or demand what the hell he was even doing, that red glow flushed over every inch of him. It took in, shocked every nerve, blinded every sense, and left his head reeling and rocketing in horrible, vibrant sparks of light, swimming without purchase in a riptide of a kind of distant, crippling surge; a shock of power, a strike of lightning, leaving him entirely senseless and dumb.

It took all of three seconds to realize he was yelling, a disorienting thing ripping from his lungs. Before, all at once, as if it had never started at all, it was gone.

AntiClopse looked down at him as he lay in a heap, not sure exactly _when_ he’d fallen at all. He barely looked up in time to see him sign,

_‘I must go. No harm will come. You are light.’_

He was _what?_ What!?

But as he opened his mouth, feeling the gruff, annoyed tones rise from him in a sudden pitch of nausea, the disorientation closing in fast, AntiClopse turned again to the sky, eyes pitched upward, nose risen as if seeking something and, all at once, he unwrapped his grotesque skeletal wings and shot off into the air. A red streak among the roiling, angry clouds, disappearing almost as fast as he’d turned.

“W...w….what the _fuck_.”

He only distantly had the thought, in the ringing disorientation, that he sure had started swearing a lot more since he’d first woken up here. Wow, had he.

When he found the kids again, he’d really have to work hard to reel it in again....

And with that last thought, he passed the hell out.

\-------

“SIXER!” Black arms threw themselves open into the air, a warmth spreading against the features of that gold, impenetrable, ever unchanging triangle as he floated there against his quarters, maybe twice the size of the other creature.

The inside of the pyramid was a spread of cosmos. As if suspended in the very fabric of space, only light, glowing blue lines, from the inside of the rooms, were to give way to the fact there was structure of any kind at all. Planets, galaxies, spinning black holes and utmost incredible features of space were all that the eye could see from inside this realm.

It was almost identical to a dreamscape the two had created so long ago.

Long enough, in a life so distant enough, that Helios had no knowledge of it at all.

But! Heck. That was fine by Bill. He could remember just fine for the both of them.

Helios came in on his hands and knees, bowing deeply first and foremost without hesitation.

Bill laughed, “Oh come on, old friend! No need for the dramatics! Get up, get up, come over here.” And he gestured with his arms open. 

It was something Helios felt a great rush of relief over, a rush of feeling, a rush of thoughts and emotions he would never solidly be capable of putting into speech. And in these walls, Helios was granted that speech too. He looked up, hesitant, but in a burning, deep and powerful need. Every eye was focused. Every part of him alert. Everything awake and alive and present, in the here and now, in this exact moment. He had no intentions of being elsewhere. No ability to run, even mentally, from this space as well as never holding a desire to. The opposite was true, in fact, by now. Bill was, after all, his everything.

Bill let the reality of that settle over him. Oh, his Helios. Always so crazed and manic and _needy_. But he kinda liked it. The little deity could only _really_ truly come to his full self when in his presence. He kinda liked that a _whole lot_.

The kid got to his clawed feet, making his way over the invisible, galaxy strewn ground, breathing in the air, settling into himself. Becoming more grounded. More solid. More real and calmed. Taking to the ground as if it would give them both a path towards eternity.

It would, in its own way, Bill knew. In time.

And when Bill wrapped his arms lovingly around the small freak of a creature, he held him close against his golden frame, the light from his body glowing a vibrant, strong and brilliant glow; the warmth of it touching Helios and relieving every worry or concern and thought from him. It cleared a space there, like a rush of cool, bracing water, as if quenching a deep thirst and bringing entire level of sense back to his head. Every one of his eyes took to his god in a calm, deep reverence. He relaxed into him.

“There we go. Look at you. You look even nightmarish than usual! I like it a whole lot, kid.” Bill played a hand through the matting of grotesque hair, lavishing in the twitches and living motion it had. So unlike any creature that had ever dared to exist in this once boring little cosmos. What a helpless little monster his Fordsy was. “Now…” He kissed down at the tip of the deity’s head, eye having transformed into a mouth, continuing to stroke those fingers against the matted hair, “Why don’t we get caught up a little bit, huh, buddy?”

\----------

It was...ow.

Was that a word?

Was that a sentence he could say?

Because it was _definitely_ “ow,” and a _whole_ lot of it.

It felt like he’d just gotten out of a three or four ringed fight with Crampelter over bullying his brother and _lost._ Badly.

“Yeesh…” He coughed, voice coming out in a rasping whisper, the blurred outlines of those freakish distorted heavens appearing over him. “That...ow…” 

Stanley winced, dragging himself up into a sitting position, hand leaned back into the earth if just to support himself. Christ in a hand and knuckle sandwich. What the hell had _that_ been about?

Woulda been nice for AntiClopse to at least _warn_ him for...whatever the hell had just happened. Guy did not seem keen on doing that, seriously.

His eyes drifted around, heavy and distracted, trying to get some sense as to what had even gone down. That seemed like a well and real waste of time, frankly, as it appeared he was still just sitting there near the docks of a very normal, surprisingly and gratefully average lake. 

Had he….what, been turned younger again or something? He winced again, looking down at his hands. And he started at them, stopping, eyes catching back to them in shock.

Beneath him, beneath his gaze, beneath his eyes, his hands glowed. They glowed red.

“ _UUUUUHHHHHHHHHH_ .” He looked around, suddenly very much and _entirely_ apprehensive, pulling his pain and ache ridden body haphazardly to his feet and looking around at the rest of him. All of it glowing. All glowing red. He grimaced, and in a moment of rare inspiration, turned to the lake, leaning over it to really get a good look at himself.

On one hand - bonus, no freakish, weird, crappy monster features. He looked identical to how he had the last time he had peered into his reflection. Still a teen, littered slightly with pimples and all. But, the one big difference was still there, blatant and obvious, staring him in the face. Literally.

He was glowing. Everywhere. Just like the AntiClopse had been when manipulating reality.

“Well. That.” He paused, staring. “Is...something. That is happening.”

And he straightened, looking around, trying to suppress any nervousness as to what the heck that even meant right now. What the heck _did_ it even mean? He sure couldn’t tell you.

He was light? Yeah, he was light, alright. A lot of big, red, weird _light._

Stan took to look again around the area, at the demonic and horror nightmare creatures that peered out and through the newly normalized wood, that sniffed or prodded at the apparent “foreign” trees. They seemed to have gotten their courage and wits back about them without AntiClopse here in the clearing with him.

Which...of course meant, some of those malformed and sightless, eyeless creatures turning to sniff towards his general direction, that things were either going to get _very hairy_ in all the worst kind of ways, or...well, he could take off and try and find some cover.

Boy to all of hell if he ever regretted asking to go on a field trip.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did someone ask for a Bill chapter theme song? No? [Alright then.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sj2Zwc9ei04)


End file.
